


Mr. Holmes & Dr. Watson vs Mr. Brewster & Dr. Einstein

by Random_Nexus



Series: Watson's Woes October Spooktacular Prompts 2019 [4]
Category: Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Crossover, Gen, In Media Res, Mild Gore, Prompt Fic, Sherlock Holmes's Retirement, Watson's Woes, Watson's Woes October Spooktacular 2019, retirement fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:54:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22238065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Random_Nexus/pseuds/Random_Nexus
Summary: Holmes takes Watson to a performance by 'The Amazing Brewster', where not only is the magician not what he seems, but neither is the act.Written for: The 4thOctober SpooktacularPrompt — "Prestidigitation: How you use it is up to you." —Watson's Woes Communityon Dreamwidth.Warnings:Kind of a warning for gore - it's brief, but if you think about it, yeah it's gross, Dodgy timeline for crossover (More wishful thinking than math).
Relationships: Jonathan Brewster & Herman Einstein, Sherlock Holmes & John Watson
Series: Watson's Woes October Spooktacular Prompts 2019 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538617
Comments: 1
Kudos: 16





	Mr. Holmes & Dr. Watson vs Mr. Brewster & Dr. Einstein

**Author's Note:**

> Unfortunately, I'm terribly late with this fic, but despite RL being a royal pain in the caboose, I still managed to finish it. There's not a whole lot of magic in it, but the Muse was so insistent that I try to cross the streams (SH/AaOL) and I was having fun picturing a young Jonathan Brewster and his recently made Dr. Einstein encountering an older Sherlock Holmes and his trusty Dr. Watson. Since Jonathan has a lot more exploits to rack up before the events in the film, I couldn't let Holmes keep him, but I hope some of you will still enjoy this little crossover, dear readers.

Watson did his best to follow Holmes as he worked his way through the milling crowd that was the departing audience; although, he had to admit that the man had a talent for eeling through a crush. “Holmes, wait,” he said, getting a grip on his friend’s arm once he caught up to him and keeping it as their destination became clear to him. “He didn’t really saw a woman in half! It’s a trick. Surely you know how it works, with the special boxes and fake saw, and all that?”

As he had been since he’d dragged Watson from his seat at the end of the magician’s performance, Holmes remained determinedly silent, other than to urge Watson to hurry. Though he didn’t shake Watson off once he’d latched onto the man, nor did Holmes slow down for him. They reached the stage door in but a few minutes, even the detective’s resolute progress halted by the barrier that was the muscular man in the ill-fitting doorman’s costume, standing in a typical arms-crossed pose before the door in question.

“Please let me through; I’ve urgent business backstage,” Holmes said sternly.

“Have you an appointment with one of the performers, sir?” asked the large man in a surprisingly well-bred manner.

If the apparent disparity gave Holmes pause in any way, Watson couldn’t detect it, but then all he could see was the man’s profile as he leaned in just a tad to reply, “No, but your magician has an appointment with the police and I mean to make sure he keeps it. Unless you wish to tangle with Scotland Yard, I suggest you let us pass.”

“Scotland Yard, eh?” The big man’s craggy features shifted from stoic stubbornness to mild surprise. “You are certainly no policeman, sir.”

“No, my name is Holmes and you are going to be responsible for the escape of a murderer.”

Watson looked up at Holmes in concern, fearing they would both look like fools when the trick of the magician’s illusion was revealed—how could Holmes not know how the thing worked? Tentatively, Watson squeezed the arm he still held, murmuring, “Holmes, I don’t think you—”

“Hush,” Holmes muttered with a single shake of his head, scowling down at Watson for a moment before returning his gaze to the stage doorman, whose expression had shifted to one of worry and his stance to one of deference instead of the former soldierly staunchness.

“Holmes? Sherlock Holmes?” He reached behind him for the door latch. “Sorry, Mr. Holmes, if you’d have only said.” His gruff manner gone, he opened the door and waved them in.

Holmes merely nodded and hurried forward, leaving Watson to quickly offer up a, “Thanks!” in passing. He dare not let go of his friend, for fear of being lost in the seeming chaos of stagehands, entering and departing performers, props, ropes and pulleys, as well as dim lighting that made the whole thing even harder to navigate for someone unfamiliar with the business.

“Holmes,” Watson tried once more as he followed him down a narrow hallway between a number of closed doors. “Are you sure you’re not making a mistake? What makes you think anyone was murdered?”

Holmes stopped at a particular door, evidently that of a dressing room, the handwritten plaque hanging upon it reading, ‘The Amazing Brewster’ in overly curlicued letters. He grasped the doorknob and gave it a slow, gentle turn. Apparently finding it resistant, he then pushed Watson carefully but quickly aside and put his shoulder to it with an abrupt motion. The flimsy door gave inward and Holmes took two long steps inside the room with Watson right behind him.

The scene that met them was evidence enough that Watson had been wrong—yet again—and Holmes had been horribly right. Two halves of the typical ‘sawing a woman in half’ case stood at right angles to one another across the room, a huge pool of blood and what may have been some gobbets of viscera covered the floor beneath it. The two panels that slid in between both parts of the casket-like case had been carelessly discarded in the mess, and a very genuine-looking two-handled saw lay propped against one of the halves of the case. The room smelled of death, something Watson immediately recognised, and he supposed he might have gagged had he not been unfortunately somewhat inured to such things. But only somewhat.

“Good God!” Watson exclaimed. His gaze swept from the bloody magician’s trick case to the two men crouched on either side of a large bag or gathered tarpaulin. Both men looked quite stunned.

“I have you now, Brewster!” Holmes said in a harsh, yet triumphant, tone.

One of the men stood upright, unfolding to an impressive height that easily matched Holmes’, his angular features shifting from surprise to outrage. Those features, though set upon what seemed a young man’s hardy form, were already marked by cruelty—even madness—one of his bloodstained hands curled into a large fist, the other was not immediately visible from the door; until it appeared with a revolver in it.

“Have you, Holmes?” Brewster replied in a low, sneering tone, his American accent understated, but still present.

The second man, who was far shorter and wearing a terribly rumpled cheap suit, remained crouched, holding the neck of the bag with equally reddened hands. He, too, seemed youngish, perhaps in his mid-twenties, at best, and made a whimpering sound as he turned frightened, bulging eyes from his companion to Holmes and Watson, then back again. In a reedy, shaky voice, the frightened man whined, “Oh, no, Johnny. No.”

Watson moved to put himself between Holmes and the barrel of Brewster’s gun, but Holmes put out an arm to stop him, not looking away from Brewster as he said calmly, “I should advise you to listen to your friend. Do you think we came alone?”

“Of course the two of you came alone,” Brewster said dismissively. “You could hardly have convinced any of Gloucestershire’s finest that you wanted to arrest a magician about to saw a woman in half. You happened upon me by chance. You could have had no way of knowing that I had done away with that foppish hack and took his place for a little… creative prestidigitation.”

Frowning at the disdainful manner in which Brewster had said ‘Gloucestershire’s finest’, Watson kept his eyes on the big man’s weapon, knowing Holmes would have his attention riveted to Brewster himself. Surprisingly for such a small village in a rather rustic county, the local constabulary had been quite accommodating to Holmes’ requests of them. He opened his mouth to counter Brewster’s contemptuous words, but Holmes cut him off before he’d uttered more than a single syllable.

“Perhaps you should have made certain that ‘hack’ was as useless as you presumed,” Holmes suggested dryly. “Despite his lack of polish when it comes to producing rabbits and doves—or convincingly sawing a woman in half—the man you replaced proved rather deft at untying knots whilst holding his breath for a surprising amount of time.”

Brewster made a low, growling sound in his throat, jaw blatantly clenched as he turned a narrow-eyed glare upon his wincing assistant.

“Johnny, I tied the knots the best I know how,” said assistant protested. “How could I predict he’d actually be able to get out of the sack?” His words, now that he had spoken enough of them for Watson to notice his accent, revealed he very likely came from Germany, or thereabouts.

“You were supposed to kill him _before_ putting him in the sack, Herman!” snarled Brewster.

“You know I don’t like that part, Johnny,” Herman said, looking pained and even more nervous, if that were possible. “All the blood… and the screaming…” He shuddered, shaking his head, shoulders high for a moment.

“What I fail to understand,” Brewster rumbled in something like furious bewilderment, “is how you managed to earn top marks at Heidelberg with such a weak stomach. Besides, you helped me get him into the sack!”

“Shh!” Herman shushed Brewster, patting the air in his direction and glancing nervously at Watson and Holmes, and then returning his slightly prominent gaze to Brewster. “It’s different when they’re already dead… or unconscious… I’ve told you, Johnny.”

Inhaling deeply, craggy features twisting into more blatant anger, Brewster turned upon the smaller man, gesturing with his revolver more as if it were an extension of his hand than a weapon. “_Doctor_ Einstein, how many times—”

In that moment, when Brewster’s attention and his gun were distracted from himself and Holmes, Watson swung his walking stick up swiftly. Brewster gave a rough cry that faded into a snarl, the gun clattering to the floor and skidding almost to Watson’s feet.

“Johnny!” Dr. Einstein gasped.

“Come along, _Doctor_,” growled Brewster, grabbing his cohort’s arm to drag him upright. At the same time, Brewster swept his leg out, kicking the lumpy bag holding the remains of the former magician’s assistant, which then flopped over and spilled its gory contents across the floor in Watson and Holmes’ path.

“Bloody hell!” Watson exclaimed, instinctively stopping short to avoid stepping on—or perhaps _in_—the remains. His hesitation blocked Holmes’, meaning the two young criminals were able to dash out the door and slam it behind them.

By the time they got past the disturbing obstacle and into the narrow hallway outside the dressing room, there was no site of their quarry; however, they heard a commotion in the direction of the stage door, toward which Holmes immediately led the way.

Several of the local police force were gathered at the door that led from the backstage area into an alley behind the theatre, and two of the burliest amongst them were in the process of trying to batter the door open. A man in an exceedingly dapper chequered suit stood to one side, looking a perfect cross between frightened and annoyed.

“You’re the theatre manager,” Holmes said only moments after taking in the scene. “What’s gone wrong with the key?”

“Someone’s jammed the lock on the other side!” He replied, holding up a bent key between thumb and forefinger, the rest of the jingling keyring dangling from it.

Holmes didn’t say anything further to the man; instead, he jabbed a finger at two of the waiting constables as he said, “You and you, come with us. The rest of you get that door open!” There was no doubt in Watson’s mind what Holmes’ _us_ meant. He was on the Holmes’ heels all the way, into the main theater and out through the lobby. Holmes paused but an instant, looking both ways along the street, before leading the way around the side of the theater toward the alley.

Unfortunately, as Watson had feared, Brewster and Einstein were gone and, luckily, only Watson was close enough to hear Holmes’ muttered curses upon realizing that fact. As well as his laboured breathing—along with Watson’s own, of course; neither of them were in poor shape, for their age, but they certainly weren’t young anymore, either.

Despite a coordinated search in the neighborhood and beyond, including the train station and the roads out of town, the murderer and his accomplice were nowhere to be found.

Later, on the train back to London, Holmes was silent for the majority of the journey, despite Watson’s attempts to engage him. When they were nearly to their destination, Holmes finally said musingly, “This sort of debacle leads me to reconsider retirement.”

~~~

It wasn’t until some years later, after Holmes and Watson had retired to a cottage on the Sussex Downs, that Watson read a small article about how the long-pursued murderer, Jonathan Brewster, was apprehended in—of all places—the American town in which he had been born: New York. The borough known as Brooklyn, to be precise. Curiously enough, no mention was made of his long-time accomplice, Dr. Einstein. Watson wondered if the timid little doctor had managed to escape arrest, or had been done away with by Brewster somewhere along the way.

Given that this was one of the few cases which Holmes never managed to bring to a satisfactory conclusion, Watson didn’t call attention to the article. The retired detective never mentioned the article or the topic in any way; however, there was a great deal of what Watson humorously termed ‘violin abuse’ the day after the article had appeared in the paper, which Watson took as a sign Holmes had most probably seen it for himself.

Deciding it was best to continue to let sleeping dogs lie, Watson discreetly disposed of the offending newspaper by using it to light a fire while Holmes’ violin wailed and screeched from the depths of the bedroom upstairs.

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't mention anything about slash (SH/JW), because the nod to it is so infinitesimal that it barely counts (there was only one bedroom!). However, if it makes anyone happy to consider the fact that the retirement cottage in Sussex only has one bedroom, then you go, my dears, enjoy!


End file.
